Giving campaigning journalism a bad name

Today's Telegraph shows the perils of campaigning journalism. It claims that the government's policy on changes to road tax are in "disarray" following a report by the Commons Environmental Audit Committee. According to the BBC, which does its best to made it a negative story, the committee says the plans are "step in the right direction" and should be bolder to increase the environmental impact.

But the Telegraph is not campaigning for a bolder policy and is determined to pull out the negatives.

The rise in road tax offered "little benefit" to the environment and gave green taxes "a bad name", the MPs said.

Having thrown objectivity out of the window, the Telegraph is also making the best of the committee's finding that the application of the tax to existing cars is not a retrospective tax, pointing to a minority of the committee who think it is.

Desperate

Speaking of non-stories, the Sunday Telegraph says that 5.6 million motorists

will have to pay £15 more vehicle excise duty from April,

The Telegraph continues its preposterous campaign against the restructuring of road tax in the face of evidence that it might be working. As sales of 4x4s drop by nearly a fifth and sales of mid-size cars fall too, the Telegraph claims that it is hard up families that are being persecuted. The new tax bands haven't even been brought in yet but:

The biggest fall was for 4x4s, followed by sports cars which recorded a 14.5 per cent drop, and family cars. However, there was a sharp rise in the sales of so-called "Mini" cars such as smart cars which rose by 120 per cent.

Apparently, we should be worried if there are fewer new cars on the road:

While the new car market is being affected by the worsening economic conditions with families facing rising fuel, food and mortgage bills, motoring camapigners said the proposed tax changes had undoubtedly contributed to the fall in sales.

The paper claims that there is a growing revolt over the rises but can only stump up a tory spokesperson and the car lobby to attack it.